> Farooqi’s ‘crime, for which he was arrested at his home on the evening of September 11, was to have tweeted criticism of the Pakistani government and military

> Farooqi’s ‘crime, for which he was arrested at his home on the evening of September 11, was to have tweeted criticism of the Pakistani government and military, particularly regarding the actions of a religious organization known for inciting violence against the minority Shia Muslim sect. > Last month, the government made public a new expansion to PECA that would outlaw online criticism of the government and public office holders; allow the government to ban online platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube; and require all platforms – including messaging apps like WhatsApp – to share users’ decrypted data with authorities without judicial oversight. > The new regulations require large technology and social media companies to establish offices and data centers on Pakistani soil within 18 months, give the government the power to impose fines of up to $3.14m and allow authorities to block online platforms for violations of government censorship and data surveillance requests. > “We tried to tell them that you cannot blanket ban things,” said a social media company representative with knowledge of one of the meetings, speaking on condition of anonymity. “You need to keep certain principles in mind. You can’t just ban everything that you don’t like.” > The representative said the government ignored all of the social media company’s concerns, particularly those regarding requirements for large companies with more than half a million users, like Facebook, Twitter and others, to establish data servers on Pakistani soil. > One of the core concerns of rights groups and technology companies has been around the requirement for all online platforms in Pakistan to provide decrypted data to law enforcement authorities without a warrant. > The new rules require such companies to provide “any information or data or content or sub-content contained in any information system owned or managed or run by the [company] in decrypted, readable and comprehensible format or plain version”. > The requirement to break encryption could also cripple local technology-driven businesses that require secure communications for financial transactions. > “E-commerce and e-banking will all suffer, because it will make that whole system vulnerable,” says Aziz. “They want gateway level filters that do deep packet inspection.” > The new regulations set a fine of up to $3.14m for companies that fail to comply with any part of the rules, including requirements to accede to government censorship requests within six hours in some cases. > The main areas of concern for rights groups are the clauses of the regulations that deal with banning content based on the “the glory of Islam”, “the integrity, security or defense of Pakistan” or “public order, decency or morality”. > Certain opposition politicians’ speeches are blocked from television news coverage, editors are routinely sent “advice” on how to cover events and coverage critical of the military is commonly muzzled, journalists have told Al Jazeera. > One of the tweets for which Farooqi, the journalist, was arrested included a reference to an article in his newspaper that had been censored by the authorities. The tweet was accused of being “anti-state”. > “The motive [behind my arrest] was clear: to end criticism, and the larger motive is to send a message of deterrence, to show […] that if I can be picked up, then anyone can be picked up.”